Mother Jones: An End to Parking?

Here’s a fascinating article on parking – history, present, and future, that gets into the future of cars altogether. People are buying fewer cars and using more ride-sharing tools. Now, just because the Millennial generation is not interested in owning cars, that’s no guarantee their children won’t embrace them. But there are good reasons to reduce the number of cars on the road and in parking lots, and good reasons to walk, bicycle, use public transit and ride-share.

But here’s a case where a change in habits will decimate an industry. Car makers and dealers will go out of business or greatly reduce. I think it’s best if these businesses start looking now for ways to get through this change. If we can see it coming, there’s no reason to let it destroy livelihoods and lives… do something else. Adjust early and don’t wait for the tsunami of failure.

What do you think car makers and dealers can do in the future? How can they evolve?

2 thoughts on “Mother Jones: An End to Parking?”

Unfortunately, as much as adjusting would be the way to go, many will likely go the way of extinction due to the inability to really maneuver in an environment giving clear signs change isn’t just imminent, it’s happening.

I guess it’s human nature to bury our heads in the sand. At least it is for some percentage of humanity. These are the folks who can’t adapt, and in the Darwinian way of things, they’re the ones who die early. Humanity has spread over the globe because we’ve learned to be adaptable, but our history is filled with lost civilizations, because on the smaller scale, not everyone can adapt. Or can’t adapt as fast as the next guy.

People will use the “put too many people out of work” excuse to prevent needed change, when really, we should be able to fix a problem we can see coming.